Abreviated HOUSE HELP FILE ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ How to "Get Around" It can be a little tricky at first...here's what to do. The FASTEST way to move your HOUSE around is by CLICKING the MOVING SQUARES--to the right of the main buttons. The moving squares represent NINE screen positions... the four corners, and center positions of your screen. A single click on any square places your HOUSE in a similar position to the square in the box. You can also press the button "P". (PLACEMENT) This is a more traditional way of moving Windows ...using A MENU bar to drag HOUSE to some point on your screen. You will soon notice that HOUSE does NOT let you move to a position off--screen. HOUSE corrects for 'overshoots' of the edges. In other words, HOUSE will always pick an address that's on your screen!" MORE INFO on MOVING AROUND And SIZING HOUSE The S M L < > and ^^^ buttons size the HOUSE. After pressing these buttons, look at the MENUBOX in the center of the screen for a list of more positions/modes. Clicking MENU BOX items activates them. Other modes include Roof only, Basement Only, and Left Menu Bar. Try them out! CLICKING the HOUSE.FORM to SIZE it! It takes some getting used to! Clicking around the form, especially BETWEEN the JUMP buttons at the BOTTOM of your screen will change the size of your House...you'll see how things work with a little practice. All modes, except CITY mode, will size HOUSE when a FORM.CLICK occurs. If you just want a FEW MORE LINES OF YOUR LISTS, click the VERY BOTTOM of the HOUSE, usually BETWEEN the DIR.JUMP and FILE.JUMP buttons. The amount of EXTRA HEIGHT you get is related to the CURRENT FONTSIZE. MEMORIZED POSITIONS: Once your HOUSE is the way you want it... CLICK the SET button and then click DEC & MEM to STORE your layout. (MENUBOX) HOUSE can store/recall up to four layouts. Your screen position, HOUSE size, Window colors and Font sizes are all stored for recall. To recall..the sequence is SET-DEC-DO-(1-4). ******************************************************************************* **UNDERSTANDING THE MAIN BUTTONS******** [ICON, S,M,L,P ^^^ < > ] These buttons can help you size & place your HOUSE. Icon = Make House as small as possible. S = Make HOUSE very small, but not an ICON. M = Make House Medium sized. L = Make House LARGE. P = PLACE/MOVE House manually. NOTE: Clicking the CPU Window (Blinking Squares) will place/move HOUSE very rapidly..try it! ^^^ Toggles between THIN and NORMAL HOUSE Height. Think of this as the door to the ROOF if you like! < Makes HOUSE Narrower > Makes HOUSE WIDER RUN: In SMALL-Menu-Mode this button runs the current HOUSE MENU item. In ALL other modes (bigger sizes) this button allows you to set the WINDOW STATE for the next launch of programs. You can also RUN the menu program or currently selected file by clicking !M or !F in the MENU BOX. (Center) SET: Decorate: DO - Recalls one of FOUR Sets of Colors, Fonts, & Screen Positions from Memory. (Redecorates your HOUSE from memory!) MEM - Memorizes your current HOUSE colors, Font Size, and Screen Location. Color: (TOP RM INF MNU DIR EXT HSE ?) Allows you to change the colors of the various display lists, info Windows & more, within HOUSE itself. ? = Help (Explains how to change colors) Font: SML SM MED ML L VL XL BLD Chg HOUSE lets you set new Font Sizes or CHANGE Font Types. (Does not affect system fonts. You would use the Control Panel to do that.) SYS: Shows free system resources. TIM: Toggles the CLOCK in the upper right, on or off. (The clock can be DRAGGED to new locations.) CPU: Toggles the 'thinking lights' on or off! Those dizzy little blinking squares! (Quick Placement Window still works, regardless.) GRB: GRAB...Makes HOUSE 'come out on top' if MOUSE passes over it. On/Off toggle. When GRAB is ON, (Default) HOUSE will grab the FOCUS anytime your mouse passes over the form. **!!!** END: END HOUSE Session..quit the program....board up the HOUSE! REMEMBER TO QUIT....the command is SET-END CITY: Draw colorful cities automatically! Just move your MOUSE AROUND! MOD: Sets the PEN color-logic for drawing. AND NOT OR XOR INVERT & More OBJECTS: Choose from TRE Trees BLD Buildings RF Roof or hills CLd Clouds Sqr Little Squares CLR: Clears (ERASES) your picture! Lnd: Creates a landscape background effect..erases current drawing! (Best with SVGA and 32K-colors mode.) N: Normal..temporary drawing mode. No cut & paste. P: Permanent drawing - paste mode. Allows cut & paste. Clp: Copies House drawing to the clipboard. DRAWING ACTION is activated (ON/OFF) by your MOUSE CLICKS.!!! SORT: DIR Shows the curent file directory sorted alphabetically. You can DOUBLE CLICK these, or any other FILENAMES to RUN or SEE THEM. MNU Sorts the MENU (MNU) alphabetically. AGAIN: SAV: Save a list to--disk of the programs & files you have been using...up to 100. Logs the time you used them too. DEL: Removes a single item from your on-board launch-log. DM: Remove ALL launch-log items BEFORE the currently selected item...(Erases your tracks...) MENU: GET: Load a new HOUSE menu. SAV: Save the current menu to disk. RM: Remove an ITEM (Room) from your HOUSE menu. SRT: A fast way to sort the menu. ADD: Add ON additional Rooms by merging-in a new House menu. NEW: Start a new menu from the ground up...... DUP: Duplicate a menu item...clone a room. CLR: Clears the menu item Commandline (furniture!) info passed to the program at run-time. Of COURSE..you CAN edit your MOUSE menu directly by clicking your mouse inside any of the TEXT boxes! FND: Where is HOME? Hansel, Gretel, and HOUSE all know! But only HOUSE will take you there. DIR: MAK: Make a directory on disk. Otherwise known as a hallway! REM: Remove a directory from disk. CPY: Copy the FILENAMES, DATES & SIZES to a record-file on disk. Only INFO is recorded, not the files themselves. Think of it as a PHOTOCOPY of the current directory listing but with more info. FILES: ADD: Adds the currently selected FILE or program to your HOUSE menu. HOUSE chooses HOSTS when needed, but you can change them if you like...just click on the menu text & 'edit away'. PUT: Puts the currently selected file in the COMMANDLINE of the CURRENT menu item. Like furniture in a room, this info compliments' the room. You could PUT a file called pic.bmp into a room with PAINTBRUSH...then it would run with PIC.BMP already loaded. SIZ: Shows file date & size for the currently selected file. CPY: Allows you to copy files. TAKE your time here! HOUSE is rather 'unusual' in the way it copies! Once you 'get the hang of it' you may find it VERY useful! 'I' Like it! The file names are 'cached' so you can easily copy a big list of programs to several places, without re-loading the file names. Just remember to CLEAR them when you should. DEL: Delete 1 file at a time, or ALL in the current listing! Both have 'ARE YOU SURE?'..of course! REN: Rename a file. REF: REFRESH the current file listing. This is done by HOUSE most of the time..but when you need to...it's a quick way to get an updated files listing. ********************************************************************* DOUBLE CLICK ANY FILE LIST TO LAUNCH a program, file, picture, macro or any other program/sourcefile. HOST programs are determined by HOUSE. Double click the HOST-LIST for more info on editing HOST files. DOUBLE CLICKING an EXTENSION LIST will allow you to ENTER A CUSTOM file pattern. Such as *.* or more elaborately... House.*; H*.hse;Names*.?? In other words..compound filters can be entered...separated by SEMI-COLONS. ********************************************************************** THAT'S ALL FOLKS! HOPE YOU ENJOY HOUSE! Be sure and check out CITY mode for some drawing FUN! P.S. More and Better help is available in the registered version.